CLEVELAND — Chris Colabello continued his assault on American League pitching, offsetting a second straight disappointing start from free-agent addition Ricky Nolasco.

As a result, the Twins held on for a 10-7 win over the Cleveland Indians and a split of their season-opening road trip on Sunday afternoon at Progressive Field.

“It’s awesome,” Colabello said after driving in four more runs. “Every day I get to spend in the big leagues is awesome, regardless of how many hits I get or production. Obviously, it’s nice to help the team and contribute. It’s exciting. It’s fun to wake up every morning and come do my job.”

After dropping two of three in Chicago to the White Sox, the Twins took two of three from the 2013 wild-card qualifier after dropping seven straight and nine of 10 to the Indians, dating to last August.

Closer Glen Perkins, working for the fourth time in five days, fired a perfect ninth for his second save in three chances as the Twins headed home for Monday’s Target Field opener against Oakland.

Colabello entered the day tied with Justin Smoak (Seattle) and Mike Napoli (Boston) for the league lead with seven runs batted in. The independent-league survivor chased Indians ace Justin Masterson with an RBI single up the middle in the fourth, then snapped a 6-all tie with a three-run double off hard-throwing reliever Blake Wood in the sixth.

That gave the Twins’ cleanup-hitting designated hitter 11 RBI through his first six games (24 plate appearances) this season. Last year, in 181 big-league at-bats, Colabello produced just 17 RBI.

One thing that is different for the reigning International League MVP is walks. He has none after drawing 63 last season at Triple-A Rochester and in the majors combined.

“They’re attacking me, for sure,” Colabello said of opposing pitchers. “I’m certainly going to try and not let guys get ahead if they’re throwing it over. We’ll see if that changes.”

Meanwhile, Nolasco’s second rough outing in as many tries at the start of his Twins career left him with a 9.00 earned run average. In 10 innings, he has allowed 17 hits, 10 earned runs and six walks and three home runs while striking out five.

In just four innings against the Indians, he fell one shy of his career high with four walks. His only five-walk game came as a rookie for the Florida Marlins, pitching against the Philadephia Phillies on July 28, 2006.

Nolasco failed to hold an early 2-0 lead, then gave back all but one run of a 6-2 advantage before being lifted for reliever Anthony Swarzak.

“Just a terrible day in general,” Nolasco said. “I thought I was doing a good job of battling for a little while, then it got away from me there a little bit in the fourth. You can’t blame anything on anybody. It was just a struggle today.”

Shortly before Sunday’s game, Twins assistant general manager Rob Antony was asked about the $94 million rotation and its struggles.

“Guess we’ll start over there,” Antony said with a laugh. “I don’t think it matters if you’re a veteran or a rookie. I think everybody their first start is a little bit nervous. They all had their moments, but I’m still very confident in our rotation. I think it’s much improved and I think it will play out that way.”

Six games is an admittedly small sample size, but through Sunday, the Twins’ rotation has posted a 6.32 ERA while allowing 35 hits in 31-1/3 innings. They had walked 15, struck out 23 and allowed seven combined homers.

Those are nine-inning rates of 4.3 walks, 6.6 strikeouts and 2.01 homers.

A year ago, while fielding baseball’s worst rotation, the Twins saw their starters post a 5.26 ERA and nine-inning rates of 2.8 walks, 4.9 strikeouts and 1.14 homers.

Through the first half a dozen chances, this year’s rotation has produced just one quality start — Kevin Correia on Wednesday in Chicago. Twins starters are averaging 5.22 innings per start, even worse than the 5.38 last year’s group produced.

Left fielder Josh Willingham was lifted in the second inning with a sore left wrist, suffered an inning earlier when he absorbed a Justin Masterson fastball. X-rays were negative and Willingham is day to day.

Replacement Jason Bartlett, seeing his first time in left this year, had a rough time. Lonnie Chisenhall doubled off his glove top start the fifth and David Murphy dumped a game-tying double down the line despite Bartlett’s diving attempt.

Aaron Hicks grounded into a pair of double plays in his first four trips. The speedy center fielder entered with no double-play grounders though 334 career plate appearances.

Joe Mauer went 3 for 4 with a walk and two runs to lift his average to .280.

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